


Mean enough

by lake_otter



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Amazingphil - Freeform, M/M, Phan - Freeform, danisnotonfire - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-19
Updated: 2015-03-19
Packaged: 2018-03-18 15:49:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3575020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lake_otter/pseuds/lake_otter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan is pretty good at following other people's lead, a lead that can help you seem like you don't even like a certain someone that much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mean enough

Dan knows how other people see Phil. How they go straight to appearances first, and think, oh, the taller one's cuter. 

"Hi Phil! Hi Dan! So, Dan, how's it going?.."

Dan wouldn't know if he's really prettier than Phil. He guesses he is. If anything, he just looks weirdly feminine to himself. But this he can't use anyway, so he focuses on other stuff.

How people think Phil's clumsy. How Phil's acting girly. How he is in crowds, awkward at social happenings, hating the loud. How he doesn't know what to do with his hands sometimes, with his feet.

So Dan sticks to that, finds the right path to act, blindly, making his mind follow other people's impressions of Phil. Like following treasure maps. No treasure in the end, though. Only, supposedly, security. 

"Now, honestly, choose: Dan or Phil? Huh? Huh?.."

Clumsiness, for instance, is funny. It's annoying. It could also be endearing, in a patronizing sort of way. So he scolds Phil about his two left feet, begs him to stop being so awful with cupboard doors, lenses, spilled milk, everything. Shouts at him to die when he falls down the stairs. 

Acting girly is bizarre if you're a twenty something male. So Dan torments Phil about his high-pitched screams, about his flinches and giggles, even if he knows half the time they're fake anyway. Phil's got an artificial persona thing going on alright, on camera. As most youtubers do.

As for being smooth with other human species involved, Dan's pretty awkward at that himself. Has gotten better over the years, but still not good enough. So he can't exactly play this card. He tries as best as he can, still. A sarcastic comment here and there. Pushing a bit hard during collabs, perhaps, being harsh even. Phil rarely fights back. When he does, though, every time it feels as though it would have been better to get slapped in the face. 

The reaction's usually subtle, but very present still. A reminder that Phil actually sees what Dan does. And that he's not necessarily amused with it. A quick look. Couple of quiet words. 

Enough, Dan.

Dan's instantly reminded then, for some reason, not that he should back off, but that he's so much younger. He forgets that sometimes. And that Phil, despite all his outer layers, is pretty in tune with what's going on around him. He's also got millions of people watching him every day. He is not exactly insecure. Even if it might seem so.

That slap in the face is always so sudden, because Dan... Well. Half of Dan's real everyday struggles are exactly the opposite to what he's slapped for. It's not hard to hide the fact that Phil annoys him. It's hard to create this fact. This fact is, as it happens, not one at all.

It's insane.

Dan is pretty good at following other people's lead, a lead that can help you seem like you don't even like a certain someone that much. Dan's good with empathy, good with zoning out of his own brain and just acting certain things out based on someone else's script. So he searches around, finds someone sarcastic enough and cold enough to do the right job. Sometimes he gets too far. Gets youtube comments about being strangely cruel to Phil. Gets weird stares from show hosts.

You're killing it, Dan. Stop it, Dan. You're way over the line.

But thing is, on his own, he'd be lost. If he weren't able to look through other people's eyes, his own would do him no good.

Because he would never truly understand how he's the cuter one. Not even since the day youtube star AmazingPhil replied a certain brown-haired stalkerish fan on Twitter for some reason. Before that.

Because all Phil's clumsiness, it - undeniably, stupidly maybe, inevitably - always means only one thing to Dan.

Girly screams do, too. Shyness. Quietness. Every little detail, every awkward comment, every broken thing. The whole thing, as well. Sometimes he can't fathom how nobody understands that Dan's so lucky, so, so fucking lucky. 

He's the one that gets to touch. He's the one that gets to...

Dan's not content about his life. He's got bad shit going on in his head, lots of insecurities, lots of pride, lots of false hopes, all at the same time. He struggles to get better, to make a difference, to himself, to others. He sometimes spends hours torturing himself about meaning of his life, it's just how he is, simply.

But this - this is something solid. One solid thing in his world, that he never needs to double-check. He just knows. That feeling of his is like an internal organ. It's always there.

It's just no one else's business, that's all.


End file.
